General Historical Schema for Classical Greek Civilization

• Minoan Times: this refers to the time up until about 1450BCE when fire and volcanic eruptions led to the demise of this civilization, which was centered on Crete. "Minoan" refers to the legendary king Minos of Crete. He was the man who kept the Minotaur (half-bull, half-man). Bulls were clearly important in Minoan culture, given the evidence. Minoan civilization built large palaces at Knossos, Phaistos, Mallia, and KatoZakro. The Minoan language is not understandable, although we think we know its sounds roughly (from writing called Linear A and Linear B: more on that under "Mycenaeans"). The Minoans built up a sea empire, or "thalassocracy" with important colonies at Thera, Kythera, Melos, Keos, Aigina, Rhodes, and Miletus (all in the area of the Aegean sea nearest to Crete).
• After the demise of the Minoans, the Mycenaeans arose. Mycenaean times stretch from ca. 1580-1200. Palace remains from Mycenaeans are found at Mycenae, Tiryns, Pilos and Thebes (i.e. Mycenaeans were on the Greek mainland and the Peloponnese). Tripods, chariots, and glittering pots (as seen in Homer) are among their luxury items. They buried their dead. They used so-called Linear B writing, which was deciphered by Ventris and Chadwick after WWII. Linear B was a bookkeeping language, not a literary one, as far as we know. The Mycenaeans are the main historical period to which Homer harks back.
• Mycenaean culture fell around 1200 because of invasions, natural disasters, etc., the so-called "Dark Ages" of Greece began. They are "Dark" as much because we do not have much information about them as because they were a period of decline. They lasted until approximately 800. In that time, writing was probably lost. Its sole use had been palace bookkeeping, and so without palaces, it was not needed (isolated finds in Cyprus are exceptions due perhaps to Mycenaean refugees). After the Mycenaeans, palace cultures never reappeared in Greece (except a few places, notably at Sparta). The bronze age cultures of the Mycenaeans experienced invasions, natural disasters, etc., and a drastic population decline. Greece went from a population-surplus situation to subsistence level population. Burial gave way to cremation, but then later in the Dark Ages burial occurs again. Dorians invaded from the North and settled the Peloponnese, southwest Asia Minor, and the Aegean Islands off the coast of southwest Asia Minor. The Ionians, who settled Athens, discriminated against the Dorians long after the Dark Ages, but the divide has its origins in the Dark Ages. There are some hints of greater wealth in the Dark Ages, e.g. at Lefkandi in Euboea near Chalcis and Eretria, where a spectacular archaeological find has turned up a 47 X 10 meter hall, gold in extravagant graves, bronze amphorae imported from Cyprus (i.e. a palace court with a surplus and some luxury). About 730, in the "Lelantine War," presumably Lefkandi's power was destroyed.
  Slowly, brighter points started to appear:
  • Iron weapons appear in archaeological finds of the 11th-10th centuries.
  • Pottery slowly changes: geometric designs, little representation.
  • Colonisation of Asia Minor by Greeks in 11th-10th centuries.
  • Tripods and glittering pots appear as wealth items.
  In this time, Greeks had contacts with Phrygians in the interior of Asia Minor (Midas and his golden touch are from Phrygia). The Phrygians had inherited the Hittite civilization. Cimmerians from the North destroyed them, however, in the 7th century. Syrians and Cypriots were trading partners with the Greeks, as were "Phoenicians," which is a catch-all phrase for anyone from Cilicia in southern Asia Minor to Egypt.
• The Archaic age of Greece (800-500) starts with Homer, includes Hesiod (700), some Presocratics, and some Lyric Poets (Pindar, Stesichorus, Simonides). The alphabet is introduced early, perhaps to record Homeric poetry. In this age, prose writing began. More on the Archaic age will be found in a later set of notes.
• The age of Classical Greece (500-323) will be the main focus of this course.
• Hellenistic Greece (323-198) stretches from the time of Alexander the Great until 198, when the Roman Flamininus "freed" Greece and it became essentially a part of the Roman Empire.
• Roman Greece, which becomes Christian Greece (198- )